To not understand how this different from putting an anorexic model on the cover

[Spinderelle]

Cosmopolitan have a morbidly obese model on their cover this month. I am absolutely behind the idea of body positivity - after children my body is far from perfect and it’s nice to see companies like ASOS use larger women and not airbrush stretch marks etc.

But this model is dangerously obese and risking her health. How is that any different from having a dangerously thin model on the cover?

Perhaps it comes down to what we’re being asked to focus on when we’re presented with an image. A PP was questioning whether CEOs or humanitarians could be featured on Cosmo’s cover, and my first thought was ‘well what if they were overweight’? Would we see their achievements and their status without noticing their body shape, whereas with a model it’s the only thing we focus on?
I’m all for diverse and unusual images of femininity, and don’t think everyone aspires to look like a model, thin or otherwise, but can see it’s more difficult for some people when the woman’s size is intended to be the main point of the photo.

"Horridhenry88 but if some harsh comments from that midwife immediately drove you to eat a load of junk, then why don't a few supportive comments immediately make you want to eat small amounts of healthy food"

Most women's magazines are such bullshit anyway.
She was put on the cover because she's morbidly obese, again women put on covers because of what her body looks like. Same old, same old being portrayed as progression. I don't feel empowered looking at it, despite being a bigger woman.
Why don't they put a woman on there because of what she's achieved.
Agree with OP, there's a clip of Tess going around in which she needs the help of a group of women to actually get up from a seating position, let's not minimise the effects of being as big as Tess.

If it was just about willpower then people wouldn’t be so overweight

I'm no so sure, frankly. Many specialists in the field tell us that genuine, medically induced cases of obesity are much rarer than some like to claim, and it's hard not to notice the endless insistence that it's all someone else's fault

Easy to avoid responsibility if someone else can be found to load all the blame onto ...

Nobody can be happy to be that fat

If there have been so few unpleasant comments, why did you want th thread deleted? There have been dozens of deeply offensive posts.

Dealing with over weight is no simpler than dealing with anorexia. All eating disorders have deep seated emotional and psychological aspects but, for some reason, while these are widely recognised in relation to anorexia, they're ignored in the other direction.

There have been dozens of deeply offensive posts

Have there? I've no doubt the "report" button has been hammered repeatedly, and yet only one post has been deleted so far

Both anorexia and morbidly obese are unhealthy and shouldn't be encouraged, but both are caused by eating disorders and people with them do need help. Neither are anything to celebrate.

Dealing with over weight is no simpler than dealing with anorexia. All eating disorders have deep seated emotional and psychological aspects but, for some reason, while these are widely recognised in relation to anorexia, they're ignored in the other direction.

Anorexia has the highest mortality rate of all mental illness including schizophrenia and bipolar. Simply being overweight is not a mental illness. Binge and compulsive eating count as eating disorders, but they don't have the mortality rate of anorexia.

PenelopeShitStop, how do you eat 500 calories less without feeling constantly hungry? Besides it isn't that simple.

"Horridhenry88 but if some harsh comments from that midwife immediately drove you to eat a load of junk, then why don't a few supportive comments immediately make you want to eat small amounts of healthy food"

Because we internalise the negative, unless we've been set up during childhood with really good self esteem/worth etc and lots of other stuff. The stories on here should show that a lot of Women have not only suffered during their early years, but then in school and later on in abusive relationships.

That's beside all of the shit that life can throw at you.

I thought the difference in TH being on the cover and the usual models was that it was a Woman whose body shape isn't being branded as acceptable or unacceptable by (largely) gay men.

There hasn't been the history of Male dictatorship behind obesity, as there has been behind the size 8 and below, body size.

Look at the Museums and the Female section in every culture contains clothing that disadvantage, or disfigure Women, so they appeal to Men. We put an end to the clothing side, so the body was moved onto. It didn't all happen by accident.

Except it is very rare for anyone to be supportive. I have had virtually no support or encouragement from the medical profession. I asked for help but I did qualify despite being in the 35 to 39 bmi range.
Even my dh thinks it is just about eating less and moving more. Yet he is the sort of person who has asked me to go to the fish and chip shop on the way back from weighwatchers.
May off the comments on here are not supportive or encouraging.

I'm not sure you're entirely right there, Shambu. Morbidly obese people die prematurely of heart attacks and strokes all the time, the clue is in the word morbidly. Just because obesity doesn't appear on their death certificates doesn't mean it's not a major factor. In any event, it's undeniable that anorexics get far more support and sympathy.

Didn't qualify

If you eat protein you're less likely to feel hungry. But even so, it's fine to feel a bit hungry some of the time, it won't kill you Growing up I remember feeling hungry before dinner and really looking forward to eating. Today some parents go into a panic if their child doesn't constantly have access to snacks and God forbid they might ever feel a teeny bit hungry.

The longer we are pressured to be thin, the higher the obesity rate rises. It's almost as if making people feel like shit and treating them like sub-human idiots aren't conducive to healthy habits.

Who'd have thunk!

There is a fear of being hungry now, mostly driven by the large snack companies, they tell us regularly we need 11sies and a mid afternoon treat it’s easy for some to forget that you don’t need to be eating all the time

horridhenry if you go in a chip shop for your DH you don't have to have some for yourself. It's really not your DH's fault if you order some for yourself too.

Was there not a report recently saying you live longer If you don't give up carbs. I lost 3 stone doing a high protein low carb diet and I felt awful. Even worse I regained the weight with extra.

I didn't get them. It was just an example to show how unsupportive he was.

Just like I didn't eat the takeaway pizza he ordered in last night .

Totally agree snoopy I'm trying to lose a few pounds so last night I ate my last food at 6pm, missed breakfast and have just eaten lunch. Yes, I went to bed feeling peckish but was 2lb lighter than yesterday.

PenelopePitStop yes you are right and that’s what I’ve done to lose 100lbs and it was trusting the physics plus getting a Fitbit to have an idea of what I burn each day that has been a turning point for me. In the past i’ve gone off to SW and been told eat as much pasta, rice, potatoes and rice as you want but 1 healthy A and 2 healthy B plus 15 syncs or WW a certain amounts of points a day then some weekly ones which differed to what they used to be where it was broken down into food groups.

Then you get people doing threads on forums such as this one and others and you get some people saying you absolutely won’t lose weight unless you cut your carbs, others saying bollocks, someone else saying something else . There’s loads of stuff out there and when you at the start, with a history of failed diets, feeling generally rather shit then it does feel complicated. And there’s years of conditioning about food and various other things that come into play. At the start when you have a lot of weight to lose it does feel pretty much impossible .I think for a lot of people a kind of analysis paralysis kicks in which is why the advice to start slow and just change one habit at a time is good.

However in addition to cutting the number of calories I eat I’ve found other things have come into play which have made the eating less calories easier to do, I agree with you about eating more protein.